The purpose of this study was to examine how children engage in creative acts within the household. The researcher explored creativity using Taneri’s (2012) four categories: using imagination, play, artistic expression, and problem solving. There were three questions that guided the research for this study.
1. In what ways, if any, do children engage in creative acts when making artwork at home?
2. How do children use their imagination to problem solve outside of a school environment when presented with activities in the arts?
3. In what ways, if any, does the home environment affect children’s creative actions?
This case study took place at a family’s home with two children, ages three and six, who are my second cousins. The study explored how children created art activities in a home
environment. I engaged the children in different art projects once a week for a month (four one-hour sessions) to gain knowledge about this aspect. The projects had a one-one-hour time cap and had the children participate at the same time of day during each visit. The close-ended project had directions that were given to the children in a step-by-step manner. The open-ended project that the children participated in was loosely instructed; I proposed ideas and asked critical questions.
Questionnaire
The parents each received a questionnaire with identical questions (Appendix A). Both had the option of answering it together or separately, as well as orally and written. Both chose written, and they answered the questions together. This chapter will first take a look at the parents’ answers towards the questionnaire followed, secondly, by a detailed description of the
observations of the children’s eight art projects. Throughout this chapter I will address the use of the four aspects of creativity shown by the children.
In the questionnaire the parents stated that their daughter had been in school for two years, and prior to that, was in daycare for almost five years. Their son, who is younger, has been in daycare for three years. The parents stated that at their children’s daycare both were involved with coloring, drawing, and gluing on small objects. They used construction paper to cut shapes, used glitter to cover paper and used stencils for tracing. The daughter now does those same activities in her school, plus three-dimensional works, such as ceramics and turning ordinary objects into art. The parents’ example of the daughter’s three-dimensional artwork was a soda bottle made into a butterfly with pipe cleaners and tissue paper. They also stated that their daughter did more project-specific work; an example was her studying Andy Warhol and
creating a painting inspired by him. The parents did not specify how their children used problem solving with these activities but according to Olson (1980), problem solving helps children feel in control, become aware of changes, and cope with challenges.
When the parents were asked what art projects they do at home they responded, “At home we do coloring, drawing, sidewalk chalk, color-by-number, construction paper activities, stencils, and a little bit of painting. We’ll throw Playdough and Legos in there, too, as that’s our version of sculpture! They do all of this pretty independently so there isn’t much hands-on assistance that we give.” The parents stated that their definition of visual arts is anything that someone can make or that involves color.
When the questionnaire asked the parents what their children’s favorite activity was to do at home, they stated that their daughter’s favorite activity is anything where she can engage in creativity, such as art projects, cooking, pretending, etc. They also said the close follow up
favorite activity for her is to watch television. The son’s favorite activity is playing anything with his dad, along with playing Legos. The parents were asked what their routine was during the week and they stated:
Monday through Friday is pretty routine/busy until we get home from school/work. The children play or do Legos or projects while we get dinner ready, and then a little more after dinner and before their baths (probably 45 minutes or an hour total). Then we read before bedtime. Saturdays and Sundays we are a little more relaxed and try to get out of the house and do something fun.
Day One: Project One and Two (Appendix B) Project One: Craft Stick Trees - Closed Ended
We began the research project on a Tuesday afternoon around four o’clock pm. The children were just picked up from their summer camps by their mother. When we first began this project the children were very excited to start. They ran over to their activity table, which was the perfect size for children, having two matching children’s chairs and a roll of craft paper for them to color. This activity table was located in a wide, yet short hallway that connects the kitchen to the living room. It had a perfect viewing area for the parents no matter what room they are in. As the children and I began setting up the materials, the mother was working in the kitchen. The father was still at work. We cleared off markers, crayons, and paper so that we could begin the first closed ended project: a craft Popsicle stick tree.
For this closed ended project, the children were instructed to paint one side of all the craft sticks brown and let them dry. They had one large craft sticks and seven smaller craft sticks.
They repeated this step on the other side of the craft sticks. Then they glued the mini craft sticks onto the jumbo craft stick as branches. While they were waiting for the craft sticks to adhere, the
children cut out leaves from foam or felt. Finally, I instructed the children to glue the leaves onto the ends of the branches.
I began by instructing the children to paint both the large stick and the five small sticks with brown paint. The six year-old girl hopped right into it and painted all of the sticks, whereas the three year old boy painted the big stick, waited a couple of minutes, then asked me if it was okay to paint the little sticks. The boy painted both the front and back of his Popsicle sticks, whereas the girl only painted one side of the Popsicle sticks, both showing artistic expression and
problem solving. The boy did not like getting paint on himself, and he started panicking half way through the project and demanded to wash his hands. Both children knew how to handle a brush and paint, having had painted in preschool.
After they painted their sticks, they cut leaves out of colored foam. The girl initially decided to cut out five leaves from each foam color: red, orange, green and dark green. She explained to me that her leaf shapes were part oval and part triangle. I noted that the girl was very familiar with using scissors. The girl folded and cut into the middle of her foam. She later decided that she did not want to cut out five red leaves because she wanted to use the red foam to show me how to make a snow-flake. She then demonstrated how to make a snowflake. She continued cutting out the rest of her snowflakes and said that she cut out the light green leaves fat, the orange leaves medium fat and the dark green leaves skinny. The girl sat at the table throughout the process of cutting out the snowflake and leaves, and then towards the end of the project she stood to continue working. She asked what the material was with which she was cutting out the leaves. I told her it was foam and the boy replied “E.T. foam home.”
The boy initially struggled with the scissors. It was clear he had only used scissors a few times in his life, if any. He initially picked up the scissors and started cutting the leaves out with
his right hand, and then switched to his left. He switched back and forth between hands when using the scissors the entire time to cut out the leaves. The boy only wanted to use the red foam.
When I asked him why, he responded, “Because I like red.” He used the corners of the foam and chopped away at the big piece of foam, cutting out many tiny triangles (leaves). The girl folded and cut in the middle of her foam.
When it came to glue on the sticks and leaves, the boy glued his small sticks horizontally across the vertical big stick. The girl whispered to me that he was doing it wrong. She glued her sticks at an angle, going up. She later decided it would be fun to put two sticks “branches”
angled down so that the tree would look like a person too. Both the girl and the boy did not like how the glue was dispensing “slowly,” so they both opened up the bottle and stuck their
paintbrushes in the bottle. The girl used the scrap foam for what she called her “placemat,” so it wasn’t as messy. While gluing, the boy got glue and paint all over his hands, which frustrated him, and he demanded to wash his hands right away. After he washed his hands, he continued to finish his project. The girl did not have a problem with getting messy. She commented on how an instructor from a summer-camp she recently went to, told her class how being messy shows you are working hard and being creative, and it is okay to get messy. She then, later commented on how she was going to make the “grandma oak tree” that she saw from her summer class. The boy said he knew the grandma oak tree, and the girl explained to him, “It was not a person, it was a tree.” The boy didn’t seem to understand.
When both the girl and the boy started to glue their leaves on, the boy glued them onto the large stick instead of onto the ends of the little sticks (tree branches), as I had instructed. The girl said to both the boy and me that it is ok to glue it on the main tree because she had seen leaves come right off of the tree stump before. She also glued leaves onto both her stump and her
branches. When the children were done, they immediately helped clean up their spaces for the next project without me having to ask them.
While observing both children during the Craft Stick Tree project, I noticed them using their imagination, artistic expression, and problem solving. The girl showed artistic expression several times throughout this project by creating different shapes and sizes of leaves she cut out, as well as angling two of the Popsicles sticks down to represent a person. The girl showed imagination when she decided to make a snowflake out of the foam sheet instead of a leaf. The girl noticed the negative space of her scrap foam sheets, and that reminded her of the process of cutting out a snowflake. She imaginatively made the visual connection from one idea to another.
The boy demonstrated artistic expression and choice by painting both the front and the back of the Popsicle sticks brown. The boy demonstrated play, as defined by Sutton-Smith (1997) when he stated “E.T. foam home,” as an assonance on the word “phone.” The comment was spontaneous, purposeless, and fun (Sutton-Smith, 1997). The boy demonstrated a preoperational stage of development, stating, “E.T. foam home,” in which preschoolers use symbols, especially language and make believe play to represent earlier discoveries (Berk, 2001). He demonstrated imagination when positioning his sticks, or tree branches and leaves onto the tree trunk, since he created a patterned that he did not see, but only thought about.
It was difficult for the boy to decide which hand to use while cutting the foam. According to Berk (2013), “Handedness involves practice. Handedness reflects the greater capacity of one side of the brain – the individual’s dominant cerebral hemisphere- to carry out skilled motor action”
(p.189). The boy showed problem solving when he was cutting out his leaves with the sheets of foam. He had to figure out which hand was easiest to cut with as well as the best way to cut from
the piece of foam. The girl was able to cut out of the middle of the sheet of foam, but the boy found it easier to start from the edge of the sheet of foam and work his way in.
The girl and the boy showed problem solving again when they were struggling with
dispensing of the glue bottle as well as cutting out their leaves. They both decided to unscrew the lid of the glue bottle and dip their paintbrushes into the bottle to receive a quicker result.
When they both completed the project, they quickly cleaned up their work area in order to start the next project. They used problem solving to figure out that the sooner they clean up their mess, the quicker they can do the next activity. I believe this comes from their parents being consistent about requiring their children to clean up their messes before they move on to the next thing.
Project Two: Under the Sea, Crayon Resist - Open Ended
Once the children had cleaned up their messes, I explained to them that we were going to be creating a second work I called “Under the sea crayon resist.” The steps to this project are the following:
1. Show the children pictures of creatures in the ocean. Give them books about the ocean with pictures in them and have them explore the books for a few minutes.
2. Give the children a piece of paper and tell them to draw what they think is in the ocean right now. Give them crayons to draw their ocean scenes
3. When they are finished drawing, have them use watercolors to paint over their drawings to make it look under the sea.
4. The areas of crayon will resist or repel the paint.
I first gave both the girl and the boy a book of sea creatures to look at. They took a couple of minutes and flipped through the book. The girl went up to her bedroom and grabbed some of her
books with sea creatures in them including The Little Mermaid and Rainbow Fish. I then gave them each a piece of white paper and told them both to draw what they think is in the sea right now. I had placed a box of crayons in front of them, but did not tell them, they had to use the crayons.
The boy immediately picked up a blue crayon and started drawing what he said was a whale.
He said that it was the belly of the whale. He ferociously drew. The girl took more of her time and wanted to find a black crayon. She could not find one, so she used a grey crayon instead. She then gently started drawing a circle using up a lot of the page and stated that she was going to draw a shark. She carefully placed the teeth in the shark and also gave it two eyes and a nose.
She only drew the head of the shark with an open mouth and had it going off of the page.
The boy saw his sister’s drawing of a shark and flipped his paper over and stated he now wanted to draw pink jellyfish. The girl then drew a jellyfish as well. The boy once again looked at the girl’s drawing and asked his sister for help with his drawing. I was unsure if the boy was aware that his symbols were not up to his own expectation. His sister helped him and drew a shark and a jellyfish. While the girl was drawing for her brother, the boy asked his sister questions, “What are you drawing?” and “What is that going to be?” The girl quickly jumped into teacher mode and started telling her younger brother confidently what each drawing stroke was.
The boy became sidetracked and played with the camera I was using to tape the research.
The girl continued drawing her sea life. She drew an eel, jellyfish, shark, and fish with fins. She then decided to color in all of her creatures with different colors and shapes. The boy was not interested in coloring his creatures in. Even though we had plenty of time to draw, the girl commented on how she was scribbling quickly, but was still making the drawing look beautiful.
The boy then moved on to add watercolor to his paper. I told him that he could use the water and watercolors to paint the sea. He painted over the crayon and decided he did not like that. He was upset about the paint being over the crayon. I told him to try using more water to spread out the paint, but he did not like that either. He then wiped off the watercolor from the crayon using a paper towel. The boy only painted one eighth of his painting before wanting to stop and play with his toys. He used all of the colors in the watercolor pallet. When the boy was finished painting he did put away his paintbrush and closed the lid to the watercolors.
The girl continued to paint, but did not want to paint directly on her creatures. When I asked her why she was doing that she stated that she did a little test in an area and decided that it wasn’t the look she was trying to achieve. She used purple, blue, yellow and green for her sea.
She commented on how she made turquoise, aqua with the green and blue she used together. She then talked about shading her colors, and she stated that she shaded because it made the painting look prettier. At first she got green on the yellow paint pallet and felt bad about it, and then after a while she didn’t seem to care. One could tell she was previously taught at school how to properly use paint in the pallets. She later moved on to a bigger paintbrush, because she stated that it was taking her too long to paint with the tiny brush. She covered the entire paper with watercolor, carefully outlining the sea creatures. She called over her mom to look at her painting, and her mother said that it looked very nice.
The boy was able to identify the different parts of the shark, showing that he used previous
The boy was able to identify the different parts of the shark, showing that he used previous